Wednesday, July 27, 2011

Easy embellished towel

I've been on the look-out for some new towels for my powder room--some of my old ones are getting pretty threadbare. So far, though, I haven't found any that strike my fancy.

Target had some plain towels on sale last week, and I picked up a hand towel for a song, wondering if I could make an embellished towel for the powder room. A quick look through my fabric stash revealed a remnant of fabric that I used in my bedroom. Sure enough, the fabric worked well with the hand towel and with the color of the powder room walls.

Here are the easy steps for making an embellished towel:

Cut a strip of fabric six inches wide. Wash and dry the fabric and the towel to pre-shrink both of them.

Turn under a hem on both long sides of the fabric strip. Press well.

Place fabric strip on bottom of towel. Center whatever fabric design you like best, then cut away all but about one inch of the ends of the fabric strip. Press down raw ends of fabric strip.

Then comes the easy and fun part. Heat up your glue gun, and glue the fabric to your towel.

If you like, add some trim, such as this dark brown gimp, along one or both sides of your fabric strip. Glue trim securely in place.

Turn towel over. Wrap ends of fabric strip around to the back of the towel, and glue ends securely in place.

And just like that, you've created an embellished towel:

A cotton fabric works best for embellishing towels--you don't want your embellishment to impede the towel's absorbency.

As for the hot glue, I know it will work. I made some embellished towels for my kitchen several months ago, and they've already been through the washer and dryer many times. The hot glue has kept the fabric securely in place through all that use. Of course, if you're a whiz with a sewing machine, you could just as easily sew your fabric and trim onto a towel. My sewing skills are pretty slim, so the glue works well for me.

Suzanne, I wondered about whether hot glue would hold up in the wash, too, but I've found that it really does! I've washed and dried my embellished kitchen towels at least a dozen times, and so far nothing has budged. I figure that I might have to touch up the hot glue every few months. . . but then again I might not. So far so good! And using hot glue made this easy project into a super-easy project. :)

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Child of God, apprentice to Jesus, wife of a great guy, and mom of three wonderful sons, I'm a blessed and profoundly grateful woman. I'm also a writer and speaker, and I serve on the Ministry Team and Board of Directors of Renovaré, a ministry dedicated to Christian spiritual formation.

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